Tuesday, October 29, 2013

Musing on Vegetables...

Apostle Pack Renames RCG the C'n S Church of God
(Carrot and Stick Church of God)
 
 
 
animals - Does the carrot on a stick method work on a mule
 
"If you begin with the fifth announcement, then read those before and after it. They are all important. An enormous and detailed prophecy is now being carried out by God. He is preparing events to soon bring His people back together—all of them."
 
Euphemisms gone bad. The carrot and stick. | Lamentations on Chemistry
 
"If you read last week’s announcement you know we hold no doubt that God’s prophecy in Haggai and Zechariah is still very much “on.” This announcement explains additional expansive elements of the Haggai/Zechariah prophecy that none of us had yet understood. In fact, what you will read this week and next time may help you understand why more time was needed for us to prepare for God’s fulfillment of the prophecy. This included understanding more of what was going to happen. As mentioned in previous announcements, this one will open your eyes to things God has long intended to do with His end-time Church and Work."
 
Blue Shield Premier Accounts | carrot-
"Ponder these things. Consider reading the entire book of Exodus for many other details. These will open your eyes to what God plans. I have picked the barest high points in the 40 chapters of Exodus to try to open your thinking to what God is promising His returning remnant in Haggai 2:5what He is promising those who obey His literal VOICE of instruction and return to His Church to do His Work. Consider also reading the books of Numbers and Deuteronomy.
Do not miss what I now anticipate will be my final announcement! It explains four final elements of the prophecy that have become more clear, including hints that God left about why His plan to fulfill it was not connected to the fall Feast season."
 

Christmas on Mars & Carrot Stick Spot Illustrations
 
 "They will open your eyes to things God has long intended to do with His end-time Church and Work that no one ever understood before, and you will see that His Word is PLAIN! These announcements will bring clarity to questions about “dates,” and how brethren should now view the “when” of the Haggai/Zechariah prophecy’s fulfillment."
 
carrot stick mans head | Engagement, Loyalty and Rewards
 
"Before covering vital points and scriptures that all should now keep in mind, it is of course obvious there was an error in the prophecy’s timing. There may be other details that are wrong. I always knew this and said it to the Church more than once. In fact, we are still learning additional elements of it. Mr. Armstrong puzzled and puzzled and puzzled over certain much less complicated prophecies. He often said that things he learned came over time—not all right away, or even close in some cases. There are points we learned “late in what is an enormously complex prophecy. We knew from early on in our pursuit of the truth that this prophecy did not carry with it the kind of time that Mr. Armstrong always had to properly sort through prophecies—ones that, however great in magnitude as we know some are, were simpler to understand. "
 
Mr. Jean-Claude Barrey, ethologist
 
 
"I will explain a week after the Feast EXACTLY what was misunderstood about the prophecy’s timing. It appears we will not be waiting a long time—not another year—for its fulfillment. (Earlier announcements have been corrected.) Next Friday, I will post another one detailing three crucial elements that were previously unexplained, with three more to be explained after the Feast."
 
Poor Thai 'red shirts' victims of the New World Order | The
 
"Make no mistake. THE PROPHECY STANDS. Because it was never my prophecy, but rather God’s, it WILL come to pass. The whether and what of the prophecy have not changed, only the WHEN. "
 
Bulletin — Beware the "carrot-and-stick" syndrome
 
 
"Think of the original apostles. They watched and waited year after year after year for Christ’s Return, absolutely believing this would happen in their lifetimes (I Cor. 15:51; I Thes. 4:15). Yet they were off by almost 2,000 years—a full THIRD of the entire length of God’s Plan! However rare, some few may think about this. Here’s what virtually no one reflects on. There was much more that they were waiting on and believed they would live to see—all of the OTHER events preceding Christ’s Return: the falling away, the Four Horsemen of Revelation, the arrival of the Beast, the False Prophet, the abomination of desolation, Jerusalem surrounded by armies, being taken to safety, as well as the Tribulation, Heavenly Signs and Day of the Lord. For decades, the apostles’ senses told them that all of these things lay just over the horizon—that they would live to see ALL of them fulfilled. Think. ALL of the apostles—every one of them!—got ALL MATTERS wrong in regard to timing—EVERYTHING!—and for almost an entire LIFETIME—again, including being off by 2,000 YEARS. Two were Christ’s own brothers, James and Jude. Two more, Peter and Paul, were leading apostles. It is no wonder that Mr. Armstrong himself was wrong for a time regarding Christ’s Return—and thus also was necessarily incorrect about the timing of everything prophetic that preceded it. But only his enemies crucified him. Mr. Armstrong lived to see virtually none—NONE!—of the things that he expected to see. I wonder how many brethren—first century or twentieth century—gave up on big prophecies because the apostles—first century or twentieth century—had their timing wrong. These men did not have the prophecies themselves wrong, but merely only the TIMING. Get the difference. ""
 
Te Kauhanganui | The latest Tainui news from Eraka's Blog
 
"I join the apostles who misunderstood certain prophetic time lines. (But so have all of you old-timers in the Church done the same.)"
 
So there....
 
Stock Illustration - Man Running With Carrot On A Stick
 
 

"The only real alternative you have is to follow Christ’s Spirit back to His Church.
Think hard about what you will do...

Do not stake your salvation on the timing of the Haggai/Zechariah prophecy. I repeat a final time. The prophecy is TRUE. Just next week’s announcement will inspire you beyond belief—it is way beyond what you could imagine! Don’t miss it! "


Science of Motivation | Defining Communication
 
"None of this new understanding speaks to when the prophecy will be fulfilled. I will certainly never repeat such a mistake. Those who believe the prophecy and are waiting on God will understand how important these elements are once it is fulfilled. Remember, you can wait in God’s Church for this fulfillment—or outside. It has been inspiring to see how many have come with us beginning in the summer and continuing to present. They know the prophecy is correct and the other two prophecies that quickly FOLLOW are drawing closer daily."
 
The expiration dates for Dave Pack and his Restored Church of God is coming due.  The false concept of "soon", "shortly", "It's the timing stupid.", "I am not mistaken about anything.", and "You can wait for me to be correct in the true church or out in the devil's playground," is wearing thin. 
 
In the New Testament, when it was OBVIOUS that all the soon and shortly of the Jesus return for the first century church was not going to happen, someone, not the original Peter, forged an excuse in 2  Peter chiding the people for not knowing that time is different with God.  It's ALWAYS the TIMING.  (If you don't think there are reasons to doubt the authorship of some NT books or that books credited to the Apostles were not actually written by the Apostles, I suggest a slow read of Bart Ehrman's Forged-Writing in the Name of God-Why the Bible's Authors Are Not Who We Think They Are.  ) A day is a thousand years and a thousand years as a day.  The anonymous author of 2 Peter had to keep the church going and shift the emphasis from everything happening as promised by Paul to a longer view.  Church members were dying and questions came up about just when this great "we shall be changed" was going to happen, IF it was going to happen.   If the focus could not be shifted yet again to the future but in different ways, the church was toast. 
 
Basing a church on the fulfillment of imminent prophetic events, NONE of which were ever meant for us toay or had us in mind 2000 years later  culled from observing the times one personally finds themselves living in is a HUGE mistake.  That is one of the big lessons of the New Testament and why the vast majority of Churches do not go there and emphasise the positive "sort of people we should be" as portrayed in the Gospels and by the Gospel Jesus instead.  It's why they emphasize Jesus and not CHRIST THE SOON COMING MESSIAH.   Most established churches have learned that Revelation Jesus is risky business.  The Seventh Day Adventists however still use this prophetic shtick as the main draw.  Dave Pack uses it as well as his main draw.  It will bite him in the ass as time goes on.  Horrific things may very well be in store for us all with the possible collapse of the dollar, total meltdown at Fukishima or who know what else, but it does not mean any rescue from heaven MUST take place for ME/US/THEM.  It is just life.
 
 
Dave Pack, Gerald Flurry and Ron Weinland will all go the same way as their hero, Herbert W. Armstrong.  They have and are repeating the same mistakes.  They have and are making the same excuses and motivating the faithful to live their lives by reading the news as if it were the Bible.  Bob Thiel scans the Internet for God's prophetic truths coming alive.  So far, at least for now, he is not waiting as Dave Pack is for the literal voice of God in his head to show up.
 
 
"Just around the corner" is a life denying lie and denies the present which will become the past and in the future will make many wish they had never heard of David C Pack or those who spoke as if they really knew...
 
 “Muddy water is best cleared by leaving it alone.”
Alan Wilson Watts

 
In other words, a person who is fanatic in matters of religion, and clings to certain ideas about the nature of God and the universe, becomes a person who has no faith at all.
Alan Watts
 

 "You take your classified telephone directory, and open up "Churches", and have a ruler in your hand. And you will find that the longest space is occupied by authoritarian, Bible-banging churches. And these people are barbarians, who take the written word of the Bible literally. Because they need terribly, they have a personal need, for something to depend on."
Alan Watts

...seems true.
 
 
 
 
 
 


 

16 comments:

Byker Bob said...

As I was reading this while drinking my morning "go-go juice", I was thinking that maybe some people out there are wondering why Dennis keeps doing a rhino job on Dave, ie continuously backing off a couple of paces, snorting, and recharging. It's because Dave hasn't capitulated in the face of failure! His prophecy which he says is God's prophecy has failed both in substance, and in timeline, yet he persists, making excuses, and acting as if this "prophecy" is yet a certainty. So long as he continues to do this, someone needs to hold his feet to the fire. If only one family is prevented from losing their life's savings to a delusional false teacher, it will have been worth the effort. Hopefully, more than one will see the light. False prophets deserve to see their entire empires crumble, but unfortunately, they seem to have nine lives.

It's a shame that defective product laws, lemon laws, and the RICO Act can't be applied, but this all ends up being a free speech, freedom of religion issue, balanced out by caveat emptor. I love my freedoms dearly, but the ways in which the law treats this particular class of fraud actually open the door to, (if not actually creates) a victim class. This victim class arbitrarily accepts an additional layer of government which modifies, or deprives it of life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness.

BB

Anonymous said...

I enjoyed those "carrot-stick" images, thanks!

After leaving the WCG, I listened to lots of talks by Alan Watts, and I'm guessing he's the same Alan Watts who's quotes are attributed in the blog entry.
Those talks were mostly Buddhist in nature, and helped me let go of the Armstrongist mindset I had at the time.

He helped me "uncling" to things. I can't help but notice now that some of our friends still have a need to 'cling'.
For instance, if one believes (believes/clings/has faith) that the Bible is 'The Word of God', that person will often search for and subscribe to all sorts of untenable theories in order to keep believing it.

Sadly and of course, these are the people we should be "praying our asses off for"!
Just kidding ;-)

Head Usher said...

"You will find that the longest space is occupied by authoritarian, Bible-banging churches. And these people are barbarians, who take the written word of the Bible literally. Because they need terribly, they have a personal need, for something to depend on."

So true. Many people depend on external things to fill some deficiency they experience, be it a substance (drug abuse), a ritual (OCD, religion), a codependent relationship (a manipulative dance of mutual blackmail), or engaging in certain types of behaviors (attention-seeking, anorexia/bulimia, Van Gogh's painting). Because they need terribly. The ultimate "external thing" is an all-powerful deity who is going rescue them by taking them to a magical land where no one has any needs at all! (Religion is a dream about being rescued from one's own psyche via a change in scenery.) So great is that need that many will believe anything, sacrifice anything, let other needs (especially financial ones) go unfulfilled indefinitely (the "delay of gratification" is always a good thing, right?), if it means that someday I'll find relief from this other consuming, itching, burning, need. It's kind of like Preparation H, except the "H" stands for "Heaven," I guess. Or maybe it stands for "Herbert"?

If Armstrongism is a set of shared delusions, here's five delusions that Davey, among others, is looking for partners with whom to share them:

"I have picked the barest high points in the 40 chapters of Exodus to try to open your thinking to what God is promising His returning remnant in Haggai 2:5—what He is promising those who obey His literal VOICE of instruction and return to 'his church' to do 'his work' "

Delusion #1
Just because I experience a terrible need, it must be universal, experienced by everyone. (If I need god and his obviously far-fetched B.S. promises, so does everyone else.)

"An enormous and detailed prophecy is now being carried out by God ... It has been inspiring to see how many have come with us beginning in the summer and continuing to present. They 'know' the prophecy is correct and the other two prophecies that quickly FOLLOW are drawing closer daily."

Delusion #1A (Corollary)
If I have a terrible need for god to be literally real, then I have a terrible need for god to be literally real for everyone else too, because I have a terrible need to rationalize my worldview. (Boundary violation? What boundaries?)

"THE PROPHECY STANDS. Because it was never my prophecy, but rather God's"

Delusion #2
This god must be talking to some guy somewhere, letting all mankind know the correct interpretation of the bible is and what everyone has to be doing to find relief from this terrible need we're all experiencing. I have a terrible need to "believe" my feelings, impulses, that "literal VOICE" in my head, and strange dreams are directly from this god fellow. That and I have a terrible need to "believe" I am "that guy"! (I guess he couldn't find a better one! I'll try to rein in my enthusiasm...)

This is the step where people should really be "thinking hard about what they will do."

"Remember, you can wait in God’s Church for this fulfillment—or outside."

Delusion #3
The choices you make right now will affect your eternal fortunes.

Yeah. Probably not.

""The only real alternative you have is to follow 'christ's spirit' back to 'his church.' Think hard about what you will do..."

Delusion #4
You have no choice. (I just wanna "share"!)

You always have a choice!

Be careful of Greeks bearing gifts. And when I say "gifts" I'm really referring to ideas and and assumptions that are really Trojan horses, memetic viruses that yield control of your mind to others.

Anonymous said...

Those of us who look to the Bible for good and altruistic influences in our lives always appreciate it when others pray their asses off for us. It might have been tongue in cheek, but excellent suggestion there! No sadness about it.

Corky said...

if one believes...that the Bible is 'The Word of God', that person will often search for and subscribe to all sorts of untenable theories in order to keep believing it.

And that's the way it is, exactly.

Anonymous said...

Corky,

Do you believe that every statement made in the Bible is totally false?

Anonymous said...

Revenge. These ACoG misfits want revenge. They are unempowered weaklings who want things to go their way, so they are willing to accept the most ridiculous magical thinking to get what they want: To have the power to prove that they are right and the power to make people pay for having different ideas and values they do.

It is also the land of depressives: They hate their lives and want it all to end. They see the Great Tribulation as the high water mark to their final end to finally be able to impose their depression on the whole world by abusing them through the power of their all-consuming control.

Another way of saying this is that they want revenge.

Corky said...


Anonymous said...

Corky,
Do you believe that every statement made in the Bible is totally false?


Anonymous,
Do you believe that every statement in "A Tale of Two Cities" is totally false?

Head Usher said...

Anon 2:53PM-

How many falsehoods does a book have to contain before it's a work of fiction?

And here I thought that if it contained even one falsehood that was enough to disqualify it as the literal, inerrant, word of god. What was I thinking?

What I hear you saying is that before you would finally throw in the towel on the bible being the word of god, you would first have to believe that every single statement in the entire bible was totally false? As long as it contained even so much as one defensible statement, you would still feel you had to accept it as the word of a god who cannot lie? And the inherent contradiction in that would just be par for the course? Not unlike the rest of Armstrongism, I guess.

Now that you mention it, between the lines Armstrongism always has taught people to believe in a god of low standards. Thanks for putting such a fine point on that for us.

But seriously, the fact that the bible has long been purported to be the word of god when it is just the writings of some guys is enough to take it from the realm of holy scripture and place it instead in the realm of Moby Dick, Pride and Prejudice, and War and Peace. Classics for sure, but still not the sort of book it makes sense to organize your entire life around. It took me a long time to realize it, but contrary to popular belief, the answers to all life's questions, well, they just aren't in the bible...

Byker Bob said...

Armstrongism didn't really use a carrot. In fact, they didn't even use a parsnip! What they did dangle was closer to persimmons fruit! Anyone who ever managed to chomp down on it soon discovered that the taste switched once it had been in the mouth for a while. And, then, the ministers attempted to "spin" the real taste telling us that if it didn't still taste sweet, it was because Satan was working with us. Inevitably, authoritarian threats, and scare rhetoric would come into play. It's all they know to do.

BB

DennisCDiehl said...

Yes, the quotes are from the late Alan Watts of Zen persuasion. I find his talks to be extremelyl real and practical on the nature of life. I indentify with him because his questions were always my own. I identify with those who don't quite fit but think outside the boxes few dare to peak over the edge of.

Zen Buddhism has great appeal to me and it goes back even while pastoring in WCG. I was one of the few who liked Dr. Hoeh going to the Buddhist Temple and I feel I understand his own other churchly searching, which if he tried to hide it, he did a bad job of it. :)

I sit for one hour every morning in meditation to just have no thoughts. That is a tough one for me but after years of practice and it works for me nicely. Meditation is no thought to me, not deeply contemplating something with too much thought.

Much of the Sermon on the mount is attributed to Buddhist thought of the day that made its way into Judaism.

Anonymous said...

What they did dangle was closer to persimmons fruit! Anyone who ever managed to chomp down on it soon discovered that the taste switched once it had been in the mouth for a while.

Byker bob, what's distasteful about eating a persimmon? Maybe what you ate wasn't ripe enough, or you didn't cut off the leaves before you ate it?
The persimmons I've had the pleasure of eating were absolutely delicious, with no bad aftertaste at all. For me, they rate up there with mangos.
The persimmons I ate grew on trees in a yard where I once lived, and it was great to have those trees there!

Anonymous said...

Armstrongism's main carrot was "The Kingdom", with the message that those who disagreed with Mr. Armstrong would be going to The Lake of Fire instead.

The message is really not much different than what's in mainstream Christian kook Tim LaHaye's popular 'Left Behind' novels.

Anonymous said...

DD:

When it gets down to the nitty gritty, Buddhism is simply another form of atheism. I hope that meditating on nothingness nourishes your soul.

Unknown said...

Anonymous said...
DD:

When it gets down to the nitty gritty, Buddhism is simply another form of atheism. I hope that meditating on nothingness nourishes your soul."


Cosmology, paleontology, archaeology and Chewie The Wookie-Like Shih Tzu nourishes my soul just fine.

Byker Bob said...

Anon 9:38, I think some country boys played a trick on me one summer long ago during a trip to Maryland.
There are two basic classes of persimmons, astringent, and non-astringent. Both are edible, however if you eat the astringent variety before it is absolutely completely ripe, it will do things to your mouth that you will never forget, and water does not help! Pucker doesn't adequately describe the displeasure, believe me. Obviously, your people knew how to prepare persimmons, and wouldn't play a cruel joke on you, so your experience with them was pleasant. Mine was more like Armstrongism.

BB